Where Angels Fear To Tread
by violent darlings
Summary: Erik and Christine, and a different path. Blasphemy abounds.


Priest!Erik, Christine, and a confessional.

Disclaimer: I'd better say yet again that I do not own any of the characters/concepts/etc from Phantom by Susan Kay.

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><p><em>Oh, the gods that he believes never fail to amaze me<em>

_Oh, the gods that he believes never fail to disappoint me_

_He believes in the love of his God of all things_

_But I find him wrapped up in all manner of sins_

_My Manic And I, Laura Marling_

_**Where Angels Fear To Tread**_

"Bless me Father, for I have sinned. It has been one week since my last confession."

Erik's breath caught, his hands white-knuckled on the material of her cassock. She was back.

To explain how he got himself into the situation, one would have to start at the beginning. The beginning had been more than fifty years ago, in a small town called St-Martin-de-Boscherville. He had been born one night as all children are, with deformities so spectacular even the woman who had birthed him had been reviled, her husband recently dead and her spirit broken by this new horror.

His mother had left him with the parish priest soon after he was born, fleeing St-Martin-de-Boscherville never to be seen again. These were modern times, to be sure, but his hideousness had been too much even for a woman such as his mother to tolerate - a woman, Father Mansart told him, with an spine of steel. Luckily, at least for him, Mansart had been all too willing to take him in, especially as Erik grew and his musical skill proved to be formidable. The good father has suggested Erik pursue a career in music but as a boy Erik had been adamant; he would take the faith and give back to the church who had taken him in, who had given him so much. And the old priest had been unable to argue with that.

So now Erik was a Paris priest, contented if not happy. The Church had wrapped its arms around him, embraced him. God had loved Erik when no one else had, and now he had his small flock of devoted parishioners, who were inspired by his stirring oratory, his magnificent voice, his fervent belief, and his overcoming of what was referred to as his 'terrible affliction'. But then this - or now this, he should say. She had come like a will o' the wisp out of the night, to tempt him. And he had never been tempted before. No woman had stirred him - nor any man either, thank God. He had seen thousands pass through his chapel, heard many confessions of lust and love alike, and now this.

The first time had been late at night, almost too late to be decent. She had come through the door in a bluster of dark curls and white linen, the wind whipping her hair to conceal her face. She had been sobbing.

"Bless me Father, for I have sinned," she managed, and then fell into uncontrollable weeping. Erik had been moved despite himself. He had witnessed many confessions, but none with such a violent and honest outpouring of grief.

"Tell me of your sins, my child."

"My father died," she blurted out all in a great rush, as though it was easier for her to get it all out at once rather than slowly. "And I came here to study music... to sing, like he wanted. But..."

"Yes?" he probed gently.

"But I'm not any good!" the girl exclaimed, although, from the bell-like tone and clarity of her voice, Erik doubted that. "I was terrible, and I left in disgrace. I tried to get other work - Father, I tried so hard, but no one wanted to hire a singer with no other education or... or... experience!"

He did not have much trouble believing that.

"So tonight I went down to the banks of the Seine...I waited and eventually a man came along and I took him back to my rooms and..." She dissolved into floods of tears once again. Erik's heart ached for her. The poor lost child. "And it hurt and I felt so dirty and he just... threw the money down on me and left like I was nothing, Father, like I was less than nothing! I knew I had to confess as soon as I could, and I saw the light on here and I just - oh, Father, am I going to hell?" she asked beseechingly.

Erik was at war. His upbringing and religion told him adamantly that prostitution was a sin, but the pure misery in the poor girl's voice tore at his heart. Christ, she couldn't be more than twenty, practically a babe. "No, my child," he murmured finally, when he could no longer remain silent without giving offense. "You are a good girl, you are just doing what you need to in order to survive. You have not sinned."

The girl gasped and began to weep again, but this time it was redolent of relief rather than fear. "Thank you, Father," she whispered, blowing her nose noisily. He couldn't help but smile. "Thank you."

"Thank God, my child," he replied, and listened to her go. He felt as though he had done a good deed, as though he was more worthy a man now he had alleviated this child of the Lord's great pain. And he relegated the encounter to a back corner of his mind, to be kept and savoured on dark days as a time when he had been one individual's salvation.

Perhaps that was hubris, to consider himself on the same plane as God, and that was the reason the future events were afflicted on him. No, God was not so unkind. Rather, it might have been Satan creeping into the gap in his defences, lurking in his head to help him orchestrate the events that followed. Neither option was particularly appealing. It was a sin of great pride either way, to consider himself important enough to be regarded by either the Devil or God himself. He resolved to forget her.

Except she kept coming back. At first she sniffled quietly, mumbling out her transgressions in a tone of mingled mortification and relief, as though having to do the things she described was only half of the burden and confession was the other. Eventually she became more bold and told him of things he had never dared imagine, the weight of a man's body on her own, chest to chest, thigh to thigh. Joining a married couple for an evening and feeling the woman's small hands run all over her body as the man lay above her. More positions than he had ever dreamed possible. Filthy things. Things he should not want to hear and should curtail at once but he couldn't stop. He should have shouted at her, told her she was an abomination, showered upon her a thousand punishments to atone for her sins. But he could not, and he could not stop listening to her.

He had never strayed before. But now? Now greed and gluttony twisted into some fervid, many-headed being inside of him, shrieking for her presence and the comfort of her voice like an addict seeking a drug. He longed for her, craved her, to sit with her in the light and feel the wind on his face, the silky tendrils of her hair like a blanket enfolding him and her delicate fingertips caressing his skin.

His sermons became full of fire, his parish suffered for his agony. They were all aware something was dreadfully wrong with their usually soft-spoken, kind priest, but he would speak to nobody. For there was nobody he could speak honestly to; the one person he had ever confided in, Father Mansart, was long since dead. And so Erik continued alone down the road of damnation, with only the trembling and faltering voice of the girl from the confessional to accompany him. He did not even know her name.

But she came each week like clockwork, usually late, and he waited in anticipation that was both predatory and protective. He loved her. He hated her. He had no scope of experience for what he wanted of her.

Until one night it changed.

She settled in the seat as usual, whispered, "Bless me Father for I have sinned. It has been one week since my last confession." But there was something different in her voice, a change in tone, a new strength. He did not understand it.

"Tell me your sins."

She always had little things to confess, envy for a new dress or pride at looking well one day or another, but he longed for the end of her confession, when she would tell him of her... work.

"I was going to... do what I usually do," she began. "It becomes almost routine, you know. Sometimes I think I could do it in my sleep. But this time, it was different. He said, 'I don't want it to be like that, girl,' and he laid me down like... like he cared about not hurting me." Erik shifted uncomfortably, suddenly conscious of some kind of stirring.

"And... he put his mouth on me. Down there. And, Father..." Her voice dropped to a whisper. "It felt good."

Erik stared down at his lap in horror. He had been a young man, after all, felt the faint and barely palpable sensations of desire. But this... this was a roaring monster of lust, a throbbing and brutal screech along every nerve to be satisfied. "Go on, my child."

She was hesitant, but it only made him bolder. "Are you sure, Father? It is - "

"If you do not wish to confess, then do not, my child. Continue to carry the sin on your soul."

"Oh. Well, if you say so, Father. It felt like he was... humming, and then... he put a finger in me."

"Yes?"

"First one, and then... then two. And three. He... oh, I am so ashamed, I screamed like he was hurting me but he was not. I could not stop it. And he said, 'It's all right, you can let it go.' And it felt like... how heaven must feel. I know that's blasphemous, Father, but I couldn't help it. I couldn't!"

She was distressed. Oh, his ironic little thing, capable of disassociating from her prostitution but horrified at the thought of taking pleasure from it. "It's all right," he comforted automatically.

"Afterwards he just held me... I could feel him against my leg but he wouldn't let me. He said it wasn't necessary. And then he paid me and left."

Nothing after that made an imprint on him, and long after she'd left he sat there, the demon below his waist raging. And then, very deliberately, he made his way to his quarters and locked the door behind him. Satisfied, he lay down on the hard little bed and closed his eyes, remembering a fleeting childhood belief that if he could see nothing, nothing could see him. And he brought one hand down to the swollen flesh tentatively. "Ah, God!" He bit back further blasphemies, teeth sinking into his lip. Oh, how had he lived without feeling that. He couldn't stop, his hand moving faster, straining towards something he had never experienced before. He opened his eyes, and the first thing to his sight was the simple crucifix that hung on the wall. Oh, no, he couldn't, no, not with that there - oh...

The wave of pleasure felt like the worst kind of sin, and for the first time, Erik realised the true and horrific potential power of the sin of lust.

It had all been very calm. He had not wept in horror after, he had not screamed and torn at his hair and flung his mask away. No, he had simply cleaned himself up and retired to bed, to sort through the storm of confusion whirling away inside his head. But unlike the simpler plague of lust, there was no relief to be had from the doubt.

He never gave any sign of this to her, of course, and they continued on, week after week, much as they always done. But now the sound of her voice recalled those words, the memory of her ecstasy, lived second-hand though her confessions. And sometimes the desire would make him ache so terribly he would long to take it into his hands and satisfy himself, but he did not. He would suffer through this sin.

"Would it be all right if I come another night next week?" she asked softly at the end of a confession. "I am having dinner with... with a friend."

Envy was like a white spike of pain into his heart. A friend, oh yes, he'd heard of friends before. He was not envious of the punters who came and took what they wanted from her in exchange for money; he had more of her than they did, he had heard her soul. But friends... that was where the trouble began. A young man, no doubt, with soft light hair and gentle bright eyes and perfect sun-gilded skin and a _nose_... oh yes, Erik knew about _friends_.

"Her name is Meg Giry," she chattered on, and Erik's brain ground abruptly to a halt. "We were at the Opera together. We ran into one another in the street yesterday and went to a cafe; we were going to have dinner next week..." She trailed off at his lack of response. "Would that be all right?" she asked anxiously.

A girl. Her friend was a girl. He didn't know why that was so important to him, only that it was. "Of course, my child. God is always here for those who need him."

"Thank you!" she squealed, and was off. He smiled a little sadly. He had been young once, with bucket loads of energy and the whole world waiting out ahead. Once.

He could not stop listening to her. Early in their... acquaintance, when she had been chattering on about her childhood in Sweden, she had broken off and enquired uncertainly, "Do you want to hear this? I mean, do you have anything else you need to do?" He had replied in the negative. But there was so much to do. His parish were slowly but surely being neglected in the wake of this new obsession. But he settled back into his chair, and listened to her lovely voice roll over him, knowing that with every beat of his heart that there was more and more to be done, and not caring at all. He was trembling on the edge of perdition, naked and exposed; her voice could not shield him from the awesome power of God's rage when the reckoning for all he had done came due.

He thought he would have to end it, have to break her, but in the end she did it for him. She shattered him to pieces and he relished the pain, finding something to cling to in the brutal light of day and realization that burned him as it never had before.

She had never come in the day before.

"Father!" she gasped, contravening the long-set protocols of their interaction. Erik's heart stuttered in his chest. "Father, you'll never guess what's happened! I've met someone!" she exclaimed blissfully, without allowing him time to guess. But he knew that voice, that sparkling tone of pure joy. Hadn't he heard it a thousand times in the excited giggles of girls come to confess, overflowing with pleasure at the thought of seeing their sweetheart after their religious obligations were over and done?

"Met... someone, my dear?" he managed through a throat gone tight.

"Yes!" she replied. He could practically hear her buzzing with excitement. "His name's Raoul, he's a vicomte, and oh, he doesn't care!"

"Care?" He was parroting her like a fool, and he loathed it. "About your... occupation?"

"Yes! He said he's proud of me for being so strong but now it's time for me to be taken care of. Imagine that, Father! A man like him wanting to take care of little me!"

Yes. Imagine.

"You've been so good to me... almost like an angel..." she sighed reverently. Erik was consumed with rage. How dare she come to him like this, bubbling over with news that tore him into pieces? Didn't she know of his feelings for her - no, of course not. The confessional hid a multitude of sins, not least his own.

"Girl," he snapped imperiously. "It is a sin to compare a mere mortal to a divine being." He heard her intake a startled, shuddering breath. He had never used that tone with her before.

"I know, Father, I was just saying - "

"I know well what you were saying," he growled. "You think you have some kind of special relationship with God through me, that he hears your wrongdoings and absolves you of them. You are wrong. God has not been with you in this place. There has only been me."

"No, you're wrong," she countered stubbornly and his heart ached; damn her persistence! "God is everywhere."

"God is reviled by you," he sneered. "You are a whore, mademoiselle, and please do not forget it. No matter where you go or how many brats you bear to whey-faced noblemen, you will never be anything more than that. Do not return here." His voice was crystal and ice and in that moment, Erik had a flash of who he might have been had the Church never taken him in. If he had wandered too far down the path of evil and violence, what would have become of him. A man of steel and sorrow, lost in the fog of faithlessness and doubt until he heard her voice. Such irony, that she was the first thing to cause him to doubt in this light, and might have been his saving grace in another. Well. It didn't matter now.

She was gone.

She had fled weeping, no doubt to her vicomte. Erik sat in a haze of emotion, too tangled for him to even attempt to comprehend it. There had never been a chance, never been even a ghost of a chance. He was a priest old enough to be her father and she was a opera singer turned prostitute. But at the last moment, he had yanked open the confessional door, seen her face at last. She was exquisite, and his rage woke up once more inside him.

Rage. Wrath. His damnation was complete.


End file.
